Barbed wire fence along KCR route ordered
KARACHI: Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on Tuesday
ordered removal of encroachments along the route of the Karachi
Circular Railway (KCR) and installation of barbed wire fence. He took the decision while presiding over a meeting on the KCR and related issues at CM House.The
meeting was attended by Transport Minister Nasir Shah, Chief Secretary
Rizwan Memon, Transport Secretary Taha Farooqui, GM of Railways Javed
Anwar and other officials. Minister Nasir Shah said the
chief minister had already approved Rs45 million to conduct the
feasibility of the KCR and that work was in progress. The
chief minister said the work of feasibility must be completed at the
earliest so that the scheme could be submitted for CPEC-related
projects. Replying to a question, the minister said
there were 2,600 small installations and 4,500 houses built along the
KCR route while construction of new illegal establishments was still
going on. The chief minister said it was totally
unacceptable and asked the chief secretary to get the encroachments
removed on war-footing basis and start the installation of fence along
the route. The secretary transport said eight kilometres out of 48km-long KCR were encroached upon. The
chief minister asked him to get personally involved in the operation
and keep submitting reports to him on a daily basis from next week. The meeting participants were told that Railways’ land was under encroachment in Sukkur and Larkana as well. The Railways’ representative sought support of the Sindh government for the removal. The chief minister asked the chief secretary to order deputy commissioners concerned and get the Railways’ land vacated.The
meeting participants were told certain people in Sukkur and Karachi had
fraudulently got ownership documents of the land owned by the Railways.
The CM asked the chief secretary to constitute a
committee to inquire into the fraud and cancel the ownership, if it was
found to be illegal.